Twilight Instinct
by Tiny Love
Summary: The driving force that finds you in your darkest moments. The States may have been the first to fall, but the rest were sure to follow. Rated T for language and gore.
1. Beginning of the downfall

I was only nineteen when it happened. My birthday to be precise. As if the day could not get any worse, cruel irony could not wait to prove me wrong.

We'd heard the horror stories. People turning into these horrific, mindless monsters with only two instincts; feed and kill.

There had been warnings. America was out of bounds and long ago taken by this infection. The UK, forever valiant in it's friendship to the states, had been pumping supplies to them, the debt growing faster than the epidemic itself.

It was only a matter of time, of course. There only needed to be a pinch of spores on one man's jacket to find it's way across the ocean. Within two weeks, the south had fallen into panic. Within three, it had cut across to Europe.

Evacuations came fast, but there were horror stories about them too, so we braved the wild, making our way to the quarantine zones by foot. We got in by the skin of our teeth, and had been making our way in life is since then. It's definitely not the old England I grew up in, but it was safe. Safe enough if you kept your head down and did your work.

So I kept my eyes to the ground and set a gruelling pace for my supposed 'home'. By that I mean a derelict sky scraper in our proud capital which was once used as business offices.

I knocked the door thrice in a pattern that would be recognised and let myself in. Two young teenagers and one woman glance up at my entrance. They greet me individually, but one of them only truly matters.

"Hey Mum." My Liam grumbles in his new tenor voice. He had grown recently, becoming just an inch or so shorter than me, his limbs still a little gangly looking while he grew into them. His mop of light brown hair brushed past his eyes, and he combed his fingers though it in a routine gesture. He had his father's features, the narrow, squinty eyes and tight lined lips, but my complexion, he was undeniably my son.

"Hey," I reply, throwing my jacket onto the counter and fighting off my boots. "How was your day?"

"Good, Chloe taught us how to play poker today." He said enthusiastically. "I beat Natalie five times!"

"Out of sixteen games!"

I ignored the inevitable argument and fell onto the granite grey sofa that was once contemporary to fit the rest of the cold, sharp offices. Neglect and age had gradually ruined it to be tougher and more uncomfortable than lying on a bed of rocks, but after a long evening shift of patrolling the perimeter, it was as welcoming as a feather mattress.

"Anything new today?" Chloe asked as she handed me a bottle of warm water. I drained half the bottle in one long pull before I replied. "There are whispers, but nothing concrete. They're saying there's been outbreak on the east end."

Her face turned hard and cold. "Is it being contained?"

"Who knows, they only have to miss one person and the infection spreads." I didn't dare say more, loath to frighten the kids for no reason, but the thought trailed in the back of my mind. A pack of five can be hunted down and ended easily. If not sorted, it takes two days and there will be around fifty of the damned creatures, and the numbers soar faster and faster. It's not the sort of thing that can be controlled. Most would be brave and give themselves in for the greater good and a quick assisted suicide, but there is always one or two who are afraid to take that step, despite knowing how selfish it is to drag down the rest of mankind just for the sake of prolonging their life for one more day.

"We shouldn't stay here-"

I cut her off before she could start this again. "Not now, Chloe. Not here."

"Why, because of them?" She gestured to Liam and Natalie, raising her voice. They stared at the two of us with wide eyes, drinking in Chloe's words. "They're not stupid, they know what's going on! It's the only life they know! We survive, not live-"

"We are safe here-"

"But for how long!? Rumours start somewhere!"

I threw my arms up and turned away, but she continued to yell. The kids watched me as I paced across the room. Before she could make another stupid point, I turned back. "Where are we supposed to go, then? You want to risk the outside!? You wouldn't last a week!"

She hadn't seen the outside in years, she worked in a soup kitchen, which was handy when rations ran low. I worked the wall, saw the outside daily, killed infected at least once a week. I knew how to kill, but I was never alone. If I were to leave, I would probably be okay, so long as I was careful and never outnumbered. There wasn't a chance for all four of us braving outside. There was no way I was leaving Liam here alone.

Chloe hadn't come up with an idea either. She knew how useless she'd be for anything other than cooking, without strength to persuade me, she knew her argument was futile. I turned away and went to bed.

"Mom?"

An instinct woke me despite his tiny voice being nothing more than a breath. I sat up and spotted a pair of grey eyes staring in my direction with a look that told me he hadn't slept.

He slipped off the sofa and sat on my thin mattress beside me. I shuffled sideways to accommodate him and he settled with his head close to mine so he could whisper.

"Do you think it got in? The infection, I mean."

I pursed my lips, knowing I couldn't lie about something so real.

"The infection is everywhere, Liam, it was only a matter of time before the zone was breached."

He took a moment to process before asking; "Are we safe?"

It was a question he already knew the answer to, but I knew nobody wanted to hear it. I placed a hand on his soft cheek and stroked his hardening jawline. "You are safe, for as long as I am alive." I told him firmly. If there was one thing I was certain with in life, it was the love of my son. The beautiful young man sat beside me who had so little a childhood, I knew I would die before anything would happen to him.

The banging on the door alerted us awake, a frantic drumming that Natalie sprung up to answer.

"Wait!" Chloe hissed, tugging the young girl away from the door and waiting by the handle as I came to her side with a small stiletto knife at hand. We left the chain on as we prized open the door to the chain's capacity.

"Damnit girl, the fuck?"

I sighed and slammed the door shut to unlock the chain, allowing our visitor in. Ryan Marshall, a man with the most colourful vocabulary I have ever heard and my oldest friend left in the world, stomped into our room and scanned it for who knows what.

"You alone?" He barks abruptly in a tone that he often speaks in, something only familiarity can teach you to look past. He's a frightening looking man, towering over us all at six foot three and the body build only a hard life of a soldier could possibly bring on. With wild, light brown eyes that almost seemed washed out in colour and they flicker around quicker than should be possible. The biggest warning sign to him, though, is the large indented pink line running from his right temple down to his jaw, a memento of a fight he'd found himself in during a human war, at a different time. His looks weren't something to judge him on wholly, though. He was disciplined as a soldier should be, and had a heart of gold. If he hadn't found me on my nineteenth birthday, the infected probably would have done instead.

"Just us." Chloe mutters, still rather cold toward him but nonetheless accepts him as my friend, and friends aren't easily come by in this day and age.

Liam followed him into the kitchen area, asking questions as he goes, not sensing the edge in Ryan's body language as he stalks around in a paranoid raid of our living area.

Instead of asking, I lock the door and close the blinds in the windows.

"A bloody clicker spotted two roads south of here." He finally informs us in a hushed voice as he peers between one of the slats in the blinds.

My eyes flash to Chloe, and she confirms my thoughts. Things are spreading faster than even the army are being told.

"A clicker?" Natalie muttered, her voice icy with the same fear that is instilled within anyone upon hearing that word. "That means they've been gone a while, doesn't it?"

That was playing on my mind as well. Clickers are a late form of the infection, how long had they been left to fester, and how had it happened so undetected by anyone?

"It means we're in a high ass alert area and nobody knows it yet." Ryan confirms.

Chloe, who had obviously been awake all night dwelling on our argument, turned on me. "I told you we needed to leave! I said it would reach us!"

"That's all fucking dandy but 'I told you so' isn't helping our case, is it?" Ryan snapped, but them turned on me too. "You knew about this?"

I stammered, taken off guard by his angry, steady stare. "There were only whispers."

He groaned, throwing his arms in the air, and Chloe began to argue her case again. Liam came to my side and placed his hand on my shoulder. I could tell he was trying his hardest not to shake, but living in constant fear does not make one immune to immediate situations.

"You're yet to tell us where we run to, Chloe. So until you come up with a valid plan, you'll be going alone." I snapped, frustration increasing rapidly. Instead of allowing her to answer, I turn to Ryan. "Just the one clicker? How has it gotten to that without anybody else being bitten? How has it got here from east end?"

"Who said anything about east end?"

I paused, the silence dropping over the room. I hadn't mentioned what the whispers had been about, but somehow he'd heard of this outbreak but in a different area.

Chloe was right, we needed to get out soon or we'd go down with this city.

"This zone is going tits up, and fast. I say we pack up and get the fuck out of here." Ryan decided, indicating to the two army backpacks and one ordinary rucksack. He threw one at me and the smaller one at Liam. He threw it straight to Natalie.

"I'll have our bigger one in the kitchen." He nodded and left us to pack his, then it spurred us all into action. What little supplies Sam had accumulated were added to by ours, and canteens filled to full capacity. We ate and readied ourself while we tried to formulate a plan.

My main concern was how much England would have changed in the last ten years.

"Well we get out, get as far as we can and see what we find." Liam suggested. I wasn't fond of the idea, but it seemed like the best one we had.

"What if there isn't anything?" Natalie whispered. "What if we just walk and we reach the sea?"

"Well anything's better than what this place will be soon." I mutter, but place a reassuring hand on her shoulder. "There are more zones than just London, so there has to be other survivors outside."

It seemed to ease her mind a little, and she smiled weakly at me.

"How do we get out then?" Chloe asks, and everybody looks at me. Seeing how I work the wall, I would be our best bet at formulating a plan.

I didn't reply right away, but the concentrating look on my face told them not to push the question. The shifts swapped at 6am and 6pm. I usually worked the day shifts, and I would always feel tired for the first hour. Nobody speaks to one another for this hour, so it's a good guess to say none of us are at our most alert. I inform them of this and Ryan nods, adding his own experience as a soldier who regularly works the outside.

"We leave at seven to circle the outer perimeter so we have about an hour to slip through and disappear." He frowns down at his map of the zone, but has no other information to offer.

The zone is almost a semi circle, with the Thames deterring any unwanted visitors on one side, a twenty foot wall holing us into the inner circle of London. I run my finger along what is marked as the wall.

"There are vents, small barred up holes placed periodically along the bottom of the wall, for floods." I explain, England is known for being a rainy, dismal place, and flash floods were not uncommon. Thankfully, the architect of the zone had thought this through and was now providing us with the means of escape. "If we can somehow break down the bars without being heard or noticed..."

"Easier said than done-"

"Well what's your idea?" I snap through gritted teeth. Nobody responds, so I continue. "If we get through the bars, we wait under the wall until first patrol passes and then put as much distance between us and the zone as possible."

Ryan is right though, these bars are there to withstand infected attacks, and the gaps are too tight to fit even tiny Natalie through. I think about what we have of use, but with laws against civilians having weapons highly enforced, we have little to work with.

We spend hours mulling over the plan so far, none of us managing to get past this obstacle. Going over was not an option, I walked the perimeter daily and the lowest drop would still be fifteen foot. Swimming the Thames would get us shot or dragged back in immediately and I doubted anyone but Ryan and I could swim that far.

It was just as I was about to suggest we slept on it when our plan changed once more. The noise was deafening, and none of us could place it, only knowing it was close. I run for the window and peer down, not comprehending the scene below me. People screaming, pointing and running away from the vicinity, others yelling at a group of high-class soldiers who shield our building at a reasonable distance.

It's only when the floor beneath me begins to shake do I realise what is going on.

"They're bringing down the building." I breathe, my voice barely audible as another round of explosions occur. The building beside us begins it's collapse.

"They're going to trap us all in here to starve off the infection." I tell them, my hand immediately finding Liam and pulling him into me.

"Jesus H fucking Christ the bastards!" Ryan began to reel off as he yanked us out the door. I didn't see the use in running but he wasn't heading for the exit. Instead he kicked down the office door next to our room and pushed Chloe and Natalie down to sit in the doorway, doing the same with Liam and I in our doorway. I wrap my arms and legs tightly around my son and press his head down as far as possible with my own on top, praying that I could shield him from anything that should collapse onto us. Ryan presses into my side and his arms settle over mine just as the floor begins to give way, and I have mere seconds to register the bizarre sensation of falling to my death.


	2. Break out

The overwhelming stench and sound of death was something I hadn't experienced in ten years, and it was more potent and horrific than I'd remembered. I thought it was something I could never forget.

My eyes shoot over my son. "Are you alright?"

He coughs, but doesn't seem injured. "I'm good, are you?"

"We're fine, we can count out lucky fucking stars the door frame held up-"

A wailing cry resounded through the room, blaring over the cacophony of crumbling rubble and death moans, and it was frighteningly familiar. We stood as one and made our way to the other door frame, or what was left of it. Our lucky stars only counted four of us.

"Mom!" Natalie howled, her throat raw from just the two sounds she'd created. She patted her mother relentlessly, trying to rouse her. Ryan, only trained in basic first aid, moves to assess the damage, though we both can tell from a glance.

"Kate..."

I kneel at Chloe's side and take her hand. She grips me with surprising fierceness and looks me in the eye. This woman, who had vowed that should anything happen to either of us, the other would take in her child, was now calling me on it. I glance over her body, the half I can see is covered in her own blood, the other half is crushed entirely.

I do not need to confirm it, for she knows I won't abandon her child, but I tell her anyway. "I will keep her safe, as if she were mine."

"I will too." Ryan speaks up, taking us both by surprise. He owes Chloe nothing, and I wonder at his reasoning, but it isn't the moment to ask.

"No!" Natalie objects. "No we're going to get her out, aren't we? We can't leave her here, we have to get her to the hospital-" her words become catatonic and she clings onto her mother.

"I'm not going anywhere Nat." Chloe mutters, her words only quiet on her last breaths. "They'll come pick us all off if you don't get out now."

"No I-"

"You're going to go with Kate, she's going to keep you safe. I love you. I always have."

Unable to respond properly, the young girl uncontrollably sobs just as Chloe let's go. We take her pack and split the load, then Ryan lifts Natalie and we begin the treacherous descent.

Liam begins to go grey with fright, blood draining more as we pass more bodies. None of which are infected. What a horrible world to live in, where humans turn on humans because of a disease we can't control.

"Get down." Ryan hisses, yanking me to crouch and Liam follows. I hear Natalie trying to starve off her sobs to face the immediate threat, but she struggles, making slight croaking noises in her throat.

"Drink." I order her, thrusting a bottle behind me while I strain to hear outside.

From the rumbling that is too far away to be immediate, it is clear our building is not the only one being targeted. There are gun shots as people protest about the cruel acts and more screams follow as they flee.

"Nobody's coming out of there." One man nearby informs his radio, which blips and crackles his message away.

"Keep the perimeter covered for twenty-four hours. Nobody lives." The voice replies back to him and the soldier replies his affirmation.

Twenty four hours. I consider the building and realise they're hoping any survivors will stay in here and the building will collapse further to squash the remaining. It's very obvious we can't stay in here, but there isn't a way out either.

The man who'd been given the order steps into the front lobby below us. One other man follows.

"I don't like it. What if they're clean? We gotta shoot them?" The one asks.

There's a sigh from the stairs near us. "We're not going to find anyone. Nobody could survive this, look."

I can't see what he gestures to, but by their reactions, I'm guessing I don't really want to either.

"Poor bugger."

The voice is closer than I anticipate, and the other man is close to him when he grunts in agreement. I turn to my group, point at Liam and Natalie then back to the hole we'd crawled through to get here. Liam nods and silently guides Natalie away. Ryan then points at the one closest, then makes a circular gesture to signal that he's flanking them. I nod and take my position behind some debris where I'm hoping they will come to. The moment I see a gun come past my hiding spot, I strike, clasping his wrist and making use of his surprise by pulling him into me and twisting him away. With both arms behind him and my hands squeezing his wrists hard enough, he drops the gun and is grunting in pain from the angle of his elbows. I have them at breaking point.

Over his shoulder, the soldier who had joined him is frowning at the predicament, unsure whether to call for help or make the shot. Before he can make a decision, Ryan has his head in his firm grasp and with one strong yank to the side his life is over. He strides over to the man I hold, who is struggling against me, knowing what is coming.

"Sorry, mate. Kill or be killed and all that shit." Ryan tells him, finishing him in a similar fashion. I wince at the horrible crunching sound his spine and keep moving to assess the rest of the area. No screams, no gun shots, and hopefully an exit for us.

"Lucky." I mutter, my voice laced with sarcasm.

"Guns." Ryan grunts at me, and we strip the soldiers of anything of use. The kids find us and eye the corpses warily. They had been too young to really remember what death looked like, and there hadn't been opportunity since the beginning.

Liam gulped and meets my eye with calculated calmness. "We found some medical supplies on Anita, she's dead."

"Took a blow to the head, I think." Natalie adds quietly, trying to contain her emotions so as not to give us away.

"Why are they doing this, Mum?"

I don't have the answer, so I turn and head for what used to be the wall. There is shards of wood and metal everywhere, making it more of an obstacle course than a simple walk down the hall. Between the debris, I can see one man; George, who worked the outside wall like I did, yelling at two soldiers as he tries to make his way to the building. His family lived here, and he was on the night shift. I try not to think about how many families have been torn apart today while he screams in a way only a torn and broken man can.

I glance at Natalie, who seems to have taken the anger of George and brought it up in herself. Her hands clench around a knife, and I can see when she looks at me how much defiance there is in her eyes.

We cannot blame the infected for what they do. Humans, however, know exactly what consequences are.

A gunshot brings me back to the present moment, and I see one soldier crumpled over, George growling at the other with a gun pointed at him.

"Now's our chance!" Ryan hisses, already reaching the hole to get out and shooting the last soldier in the head.

By the time we reach him, George has pretty much tipped over the edge of insanity. I approach him cautiously, shoving Liam behind me.

"George?" I say quietly and gently, not wanting to startle him. He stares, though he doesn't see, not really. "George, I'm going to take this now, okay?" My hands guide his to point the gun at the floor, and I prize the gun from his stiff hand. Just as I step away, he grasps onto me firmly, and everybody shifts to defend me, I can just see the barrel of a gun pointed at this poor man's head as he pulls my free hand to him and fumbles in his jacket.

"Take this and go, alright? I stocked it up." I look down and see he'd handed me a key. A car key, and there are only one kind of car left in this city. Our eyes move to the jeep just down the street. The getaway jeep he would have taken his family away in.

There is shouting behind us, and we have little time to think about it.

"Give me the gun. Go." George demands, his voice not even wavering in his insanity.

"Come with us, mate." Ryan suggests, taking the key and handing it to Natalie. The kids run for the car, opening it and readying the engine.

George shakes his head. "I'm not leaving my family behind. But I'll stay long enough for you to go."

I glance at Ryan, and he nods. "You're a good man."

"Thank you, I hope you find them again." I mutter, then we run for the car, Ryan driving, since he's the only one who can. The bullets begin firing, and a couple hit the jeep, but they'd already built it sturdy enough to protect them from attacks, be it human or infected.

I turn and watch as George takes the attention of the majority of the troop, hitting two in lethal areas and a few others to wound before he crumples to the floor. I close my eyes and thank him silently. I'd barely ever spoken to him, and yet he saved our lives.

"What are we going to do? The gate's only open when your patrol leaves for travel." I ask, my eyes darting around for an answer.

Ryan pulls his seatbelt on and swerves with one hand on the wheel to avoid a group of civilians. By the looks of it, the city has turned to chaos in protest of the bombings, bodies scatter the streets, both soldier and civilian, and I have to swallow hard when the jeep hits a bump in the road which can only be one thing.

"Seatbelts, kids." I order as I pull mine on, realising Ryan had already formulated a plan.

"And hold on," he shouts over the roar of the engine, "this is gonna be bloody rough!"

I scream obscenities as I realise his plan, not even having chance to demand he changed his mind. We fall off the edge of the moat bank, landing against the bars which cave in and snap under the weight of the fallen jeep. We clatter down to the waterbed, the car spluttering to a stop at the impact.

"We alright?"

Two children answer, but I just glare.

"We're fucking through you sour-faced old cow, what more did you want?" He snaps as he turns the ignition, then ploughs under the wall, and off into the wilderness.


End file.
